Wear-resistant, polycrystalline diamond compacts (“PDCs”) are utilized in a variety of mechanical applications. For example, PDCs are used in drilling tools (e.g., cutting elements, gage trimmers, etc.), machining equipment, bearing apparatuses, wire-drawing machinery, and in other mechanical apparatuses.
PDCs have found particular utility as superabrasive cutting elements in rotary drill bits, such as roller-cone drill bits and fixed-cutter drill bits. A PDC cutting element typically includes a superabrasive diamond layer commonly known as a diamond table. The diamond table is formed and bonded to a substrate using a high-pressure/high-temperature (“HPHT”) process. The PDC cutting element may be brazed directly into a preformed pocket, socket, or other receptacle formed in a bit body. The substrate may often be brazed or otherwise joined to an attachment member, such as a cylindrical backing. A rotary drill bit typically includes a number of PDC cutting elements affixed to the bit body. It is also known that a stud carrying the PDC may be used as a PDC cutting element when mounted to a bit body of a rotary drill bit by press-fitting, brazing, or otherwise securing the stud into a receptacle formed in the bit body.
Conventional PDCs are normally fabricated by placing a cemented carbide substrate into a container with a volume of diamond particles positioned on a surface of the cemented carbide substrate. A number of such containers may be loaded into an HPHT press. The substrate(s) and volume(s) of diamond particles are then processed under HPHT conditions in the presence of a catalyst material that causes the diamond particles to bond to one another to form a matrix of bonded diamond grains defining a polycrystalline diamond (“PCD”) table. The catalyst material is often a metal-solvent catalyst (e.g., cobalt, nickel, iron, or alloys thereof) that is used for promoting intergrowth of the diamond particles.
In one conventional approach, a constituent of the cemented carbide substrate, such as cobalt from a cobalt-cemented tungsten carbide substrate, liquefies and sweeps from a region adjacent to the volume of diamond particles into interstitial regions between the diamond particles during the HPHT process. The cobalt acts as a metal-solvent catalyst to promote intergrowth between the diamond particles, which results in formation of a matrix of bonded diamond grains having diamond-to-diamond bonding therebetween. Interstitial regions between the bonded diamond grains are occupied by the metal-solvent catalyst.
The presence of the metal-solvent catalyst in the PCD table is believed to reduce the thermal stability of the PCD table at elevated temperatures experienced during drilling of a subterranean rock formation. For example, the difference in thermal expansion coefficient between the diamond grains and the metal-solvent catalyst is believed to lead to chipping or cracking of the PCD table during drilling or cutting operations, which consequently can degrade the mechanical properties of the PCD table or cause failure. Additionally, some of the diamond grains can undergo a chemical breakdown or back-conversion to graphite via interaction with the metal-solvent catalyst.
One conventional approach for improving the thermal stability of PDCs is to at least partially remove the metal-solvent catalyst from the PCD table of the PDC by acid leaching. Despite the availability of a number of different PDCs, manufacturers and users of PDCs continue to seek improved thermally stable PDCs.